the Liebster award

Accepting the nomination comes with these conditions:

1. Post the award on your blog.

2. Thank the blogger who presented the award and link back to their blog.

3. Nominate 5-11 bloggers whom you feel deserve this award and have fewer than or equal to 3,000 followers.

4. Answer 11 questions posted by the nominator, and ask your nominees 11 questions.

Thank you, Maisie for the nomination. This came along at just the right time, since 1.) I actually have time to do it, and 2.) I have felt so out of touch with the sim-blogging community lately, I am eager to find some new, active blogs to read!

And I only just saw that Carla tagged me, too. Thank you, Carla! I will answer both sets of questions here.



My answers to Maisie's questions:

1. What is your favorite part of your sims & your neighborhood?
— Since TS4 doesn’t have a world editor at the moment, very little about the world I’m playing in is mine. I was quite proud of the work I did on my TS3 Lakeside Heights, how I got to make it exactly how I always imagined it should be, but it got too big and bogged down to actually play. That was sort of a rule for TS3 as a whole—it was a beautiful dead weight, lol! But I would actually really love to make LH as a TS4 world with sub-hoods in it. The game plays so smoothly this way! And the background “deco” world looks excellent in pictures, while still having a decent amount of open space to move around in. The way LH is laid out, I think it would be really well suited to being built in sub-hoods.

2. What are you really good at, be in regards to the game, real life, work, anything?
— I am excellent at procrastinating and being distracted. ;)

3. How do you relax or unwind after a trying day?
— Ha, wine.

4. Favorite vacation or vacation you’d love to take?
— I always love Traverse City in Michigan. My heart lives there. I love anywhere that has mountains. And the ocean. I love southern coastal cities like Charleston and Savannah. I love London! I would love to see more of Europe. And South America, and Africa, and Japan. And space.

5. What projects do you have planned or hope to accomplish for your game?
— I would LOVE a world-builder for TS4, so that I can create Lakeside Heights in it! But until that happens, my main goal is to just keep chugging on with my timeline. I want to see time passing and children growing up, this time. I don’t want to get so deep into the storytelling that time stops, which is a problem I’ve run into in a couple previous attempts, so I’m trying to focus on short, efficient updates. My favorite part about simming a whole town is always the same any version of the game—I love seeing the twists and turns that their lives take, and how one sim’s choice can send ripples through other lives in the town. How nobody lives in a bubble. None of that can really happen if I spend my time writing a novel-length sim-story that only covers a month of story-time.

6. How large is your sims CC folder?
— for TS4, it is currently 3 GB, TS3 is 5 GB

7. What is your blogging and playing process? (Write first, plan, play first…)
— A little of everything, depending on what sim I'm playing. For some sims, I have a story meticulously planned out for the next ten years of their lives. For others, I couldn't even tell you what happens to them tomorrow. Although, even with sims who have a concrete story planned out, sometimes I'll be writing about them and change my mind. Or sometimes I'll get into the game and find wonderful or terrible surprises, lol! If the gameplay surprise makes sense for their story and character, I’ll keep it. If it doesn’t, I’ll ignore it.

8. What is your favorite family tradition either now, or from childhood?
— Hmmm, we didn't really intend for this to become a tradition, but every year, we ask our son whether he'd like a birthday party with friends, or to travel somewhere. I guess he's sort of antisocial like we are, because he always picks to travel, lol! So every year on his birthday, he gets to pick where we go.

9. Where do you find your inspiration for buildings (community/residential) that you build/decorate?
— everywhere! I have been known to snap pictures whenever I’m out for things to make in my game later.

10. Favorite pizza toppings?
— Always pepperoni, mushrooms, bacon, and black olives. Sometimes also spinach and tomatoes. Or chicken, bacon, and avocado. Or some other great combination that I haven’t tried yet. OMG, you shouldn’t have asked me a pizza question, lol!

11. What’s your favorite season in real life and in the sims game?
— I wish TS4 had seasons. (It’s too soon, still. I know. That EP always comes almost last.) In real life, just like in the game, winter is absolutely beautiful but a pain the in ass, lol! In TS3, the snow always made my game crash. I like all of the seasons, really. I like all of them a lot for the first few weeks, and then I wish the next would come along. I guess I like summer, especially, because my son is out of school and we can go traveling! :D

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My answers to Carla's questions:

1. What was your first Sims game and what version(s) do you play currently?

My very first Sims game was TS1, though I got into it late and never had any expansions. I loved it though! But TS2 came out shortly after and I jumped right on board. I suppose TS2 was the first version I played very seriously. I am playing and thoroughly loving TS4 now. :D

2. Do you write outside of the game or do you only write sims-related stories?

Yes, indeed, I write all kinds of crazy drivel, lol! 

3. Do you do anything creative, apart from writing?

Yes, but most of the other creative things I do are half-assed. I'll draw for a couple months, then quit. Play my guitar for a couple months, then quit. Try to teach myself piano, then quit. You see a pattern here? lol! 

4. If you could create any mod for the game, what would it do?

Oh, man, I would love to have Relativity back, which was a TS3 mod. And the freezer clock, which was a TS2 mod. Most of the things I really want now are things that I had or was able to do in previous games. The most simple thing I really want in my game now is the ability to select and move a sim, or place objects around or through a sim. Even with "move objects" on, we still can't do that! Why, oh why? I swear, they took out the most nonsensical things in TS4. :\

5. What made you decide to start blogging about your game?

I wanted to keep record of their lives. Even in the sims games where I played only for myself and never blogged (like my Freeplay Sims, for a while, some of my TS3 hoods, and the beginning of TS2), I still had a little file where I would document what happened to them. So that I wouldn't forget things, like who somebody's first kiss was, or what they wanted to be when they were a little kid. It's so easy to forget some of these things when you're managing a few dozen lifespans. Blogging is a great means of record-keeping, and the bonus is that others can read about your sims too!

6. Are any of your sims or storylines inspired by people you know in real life?

Yes, I am sure they are. Never very directly, but it's more like a piece of one person and a piece of another, mashed up and twisted into something new. It's never conscious, but looking back on certain stories, I can see exactly why that was in my head and where it came from. 

7. What is your favourite thing about simming or blogging?

Like many of you guys have said, it's just a million times more fun when you can share the events of your sim's little pixel life--all the hilarity, the joy, the sadness. 

8. What is your least favourite thing about simming or blogging?

I have a love/hate relationship with the frequency of patches in TS4. Of course, I love getting new goodies and fixes for free! I hate that it often breaks all of my very crucial gameplay mods (like for aging and pregnancies) that I can't play without. And they've been throwing patches at us once or twice a month! :\

9. Do you plan your updates or just play and see what happens? Or do you do something in between?

See above! Question #7

10. Is there any "ritual" (for want of a better word) you have to do before you sit down to play or blog? Making yourself a particular drink, turning on some music, making sure you have some quiet space?

I'll take my simming time whenever I can get it! I can't usually be too picky. But if I know I'm going to be able to play for a while, it's always good to have something to drink and to go pee first, lol! 

11. What's one thing you've never seen in your game or done with your sims/hood that you would really like to?

I think I did everything I wanted to do in TS2, so I was fine with retiring from that game. But there was so much that I didn't get around to doing in TS3, and I still find that unfortunate, so I hope we get a lot of the same content back in TS4. I loved all the animals, and I was really excited about having one of my sims start a vineyard and winery (probably because I want a winery in real life, lol!) I also wanted to build a proper harbor and yacht club for LH, since we had boats in TS3. 

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A lot of the bloggers that I follow are people that you all have linked to already, but that's okay, I suppose, because I have new questions for you all to answer. If you've already done this and don't want to answer any more questions, that's fine too. But a couple of these I haven't seen linked yet, and they are totally worth knowing about, so here they are.

My nominees:

Maisie who writes Millwood (TS2)
Carla who writes Sullivan (TS2)
Rachel who writes The Edith Prescott Mysteries (TS3)
Jane who writes Richmond (TS2)
Beth and Gayl who write Sessions/Studio Time (TS2)
Mao who writes Aperture Valley (TS3)
Treason and Plot's Sims (TS3)
Jenba's Sims (TS4)

I wish I knew of some more TS4 stories or neighborhoods! If any of you know of one I should know about, please share! :)


My questions for you guys:

What sim from your town or story would you say is most like you?
What is your favorite EA world, in any version of the sims?
What was the last book you read, and did you like it?
What TV show are you addicted to right now?
What is your favorite thing about where you live?
What thing have you accomplished that we might not know about?
What is something you haven't accomplished yet, but want to?
What thing do you most look forward to each day?
Favorite holiday?
Favorite food or drink?
If you could have a superpower, what would it be?